Saturday, 23 November 2013

I am a gamer.I love milk on my icecream because it's too sweet.In my spare time I like to race my old Porsche and travel with my wife.50 is the new 30.Sometimes my butt goes numb.My favourite people are women because they're women.My wife can always cheer me up.I have never experimented with drugs on a Tuesday.When I'm on I'm quick.My first French kiss was at age 9 (and I liked it).Bolt and Kodie are my dogs.Books are friends I can't let go.

Q&A Interview with J.M. Bray

When did you discover your talent for writing?I’m not sure I have any, but I work hard to try and compensate.Do you prefer the beginning of a story or the end?The beginning! I hate for books I love to end. I want them to go on forever.

Favourite book/series/author when you were growing up?The Shannara series by Terry Brooks or maybe Anne McCaffrey’s Dragonriders of Pern, then again I really liked…Which of your characters is your favourite?Jule, the MC’s girlfriend. She has more layers to her than any other character I’ve written.

Which of your works has had the most impact on you, as both a person and a writer?Mending the Shroud. There is a scene that deals with same sex relationships and religious faith. It was interesting to research and had a great impact on me personally.What's one of your favourite quotes (it doesn't have to be from a book)?The more I learn, the less I know. – My version of a Socrates quote.

What books/authors have influenced your writing?I really enjoy the way Raymond E. Feist carries his characters, then their descendants, through multiple books. I’m trying my hand at that in my work in progress.

If you had the chance to do it again, is there anything you'd change about your book?Finish it when I started it twenty-three years ago. But it wouldn’t have been as good. I hadn’t lived enough life.

What has been the biggest highlight, so far, in being a published author?

The acceptance email from Escape. I nearly passed out.

If you invented a new flavour of ice-cream, what would it taste like and what would you name it?Chocolate Peanut Butter Malt. The name says it all, doesn’t it?

How much research has gone into your books? Did you discover any surprising things?Some, but most of it is unseen or part of the overall story arc rather than a specific moment. One thing I found out is that the Pleiades (the Seven Sisters) is joined by Jupiter every 11.8 years so it looks like there are eight sisters.

What's your special talent (other than writing of course)?

Driving fast.

Any advice for aspiring authors?Never throw any writing ideas away. I wrote the first 30 pages of Tearing the Shroud twenty-three yeas ago. I’m so glad I didn’t toss the notebook.

What book(s) are you currently working on and do you have anything planned for the future?I’ve just submitted Mending the Shroud and am working on the third novel in the series. The working title is Shrouded. I have a Historical Romantic Fantasy planned after the Shroud Series.

Author Bio - J.M. Bray

J.M. Bray lives in Southern California with his college sweetheart and their two dogs. After a lifetime together, they are happier than the moment they met.

When not writing or working his "day job", he loves to cook, play the guitar, and travel with his wife. Every chance he gets, he races an old Porsche named "Tuffy" at tracks in the southwest.

Fall in love, be possessed, hunt a sorcerer and save the world — and Vincent thought calculus was tough.

1984 — Vincent expected college to be about freedom and girls, but then the nightmares of sorcery, monsters and other worlds began. Not even the surprising attention from his dream girl, Julie, could shake them.

Before he's even nailed his second date with Julie, he's possessed by Coleman, a warrior from another realm. Coleman is hell bent on defeating the monstrous Kafla who threatens to tear into Vincent's reality, changing both his and Coleman's worlds forever. They have one chance to stop them: Vincent must allow Coleman to share his body and wage war against the sorcerer.

Now it's up to them, the women they love, and Vincent's rag-tag bunch of role-playing and gaming friends to save the world, or see 1984 descend into the apocalypse.

I would like to alert my readers that my opinions are my own and I am not being paid for my reviews. All books not bought are given to me freely and are accepted for an honest review. Receiving ARC's and/or free review copies in no way influences the opinions expressed in my reviews.